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The Believer 's Relationship With Jesus As The Shepherd

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The Believer’s Relationship with Jesus as the Shepherd
John 10:1-6
Few years ago I attended a conference where one of the teachers taught on the believer’s identity in Jesus. In his presentation, a great deal of emphasis was placed on who we are in
Jesus. However, what I did not hear from the speaker was how our identity as saved, justified, secured, blessed persons relates to our roles as followers of Christ. I notice that there was a neglect of how our identity relates to our responsibilities especially as people in relationship with Jesus, who is the shepherd of the sheepfold that we are members of. Unlike the speaker, it is important to note that every relationship has mutual obligations. And understanding the nature of any…show more content…
According to Burge, “In fact, the blind man who refuses to follow the Pharisees is like the sheep of 10:5, who will not follow
‘because they do not recognize a stranger’s voice.’”(Burge, 286). Another basis for this path of thought is that there is no transitional phrase, such as “after these things,” or other time markers. When we get to 10:22, John designates the time as the Feast of Dedication, which took place in the winter. But verses 1-21 were probably connected with the Feast of
Tabernacles, where the events of chapters 7-9 took place. In addition, Jesus’ words, “Truly, truly,” which begin chapter 10, are never used elsewhere to begin a new discourse (Morris,
501).
Consequently, we should understand John 10:1-21 as being closely related to the events in John 9, where Jesus healed the man born blind. The connection here is this: the Pharisees,

the religious leaders in Israel, should have been faithful shepherds over God’s flock, but they had failed Israel. In the story of blind man, we see an sample illustration when the Pharisees turned on the blind man in anger. They are frustrated with the blind man’s testimony concerning Jesus, thereby resulting in the ultimate dismissal of blind man from the temple.
Throughout the healing scenery of the blind man, the Pharisees are seen nowhere rejoicing over the wonderful fact that this man’s eyes had been opened. On the contrary, they were more concerned that Jesus had violated their legalistic Sabbath rules than they
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